Studio: international art (84.1922)

THE ARTS AND CRAFTS STUDENT
AND THAT DRAWING-ROOM
MANTELPIECE. 0000

Iwas much struck by the technical per-
fection and general excellence of the
students' work exhibited at the Central
School of Arts and Crafts. One wondered,
though—seeing how excellent was the work-
manship of many of the exhibits—why
the impression left was not wholly satisfying.

In judging modern work one should
not forget that certain qualities it must
lack : those supplied by time and use. A
teapot, straight from the workshop of the
silversmith, may be a thing of beauty and
a technical triumph, but, nevertheless,
its beauty will be enormously enhanced
when it has poured tea for a decade and
acquired the mellow and inimitable finish
that unconscious handling and the magic

cloth of the housewife alone can give it
in a thousand cleanings. But there are
still other qualities that should not be,
but are, lacking in modern work—origin-
ality, as a rule; though this quality is
never lacking where the artist has real
inspiration. What are the others i Is
humility, by any chance, one of the other
lacking qualities i Is not the middle
of the drawing-room mantelpiece always
the Mecca of the modern craftsman!
He longs (not to be there himself) but to
see the product of his inspiration placed
in this, the most honoured position in the
English home. 0000
Now, the owners of drawing-rooms can
be roughly divided into two classes. The
first bows to venerable custom and places
the clock (for choice, one with garlands
of ormolu and a coloured face) in the middle
of the drawing-room mantelpiece. The

METAL WORK BY STUDENTS OF THE LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL CENTRAL SCHOOL OF ARTS AND CRAFTS
(TOP ROW) HOT WATER JUG BY C. W. GROSE J BOWL BY A. B. WATKINS ; SUGAR BOWL AND MILK
EWER BY W. WRIGHT

(BELOW) TEAPOT BY W. WRIGHT J POT, WITH INCISED LID, BY B. S. CRESSER J HOT WATER
JUG BY A. D. MIALL

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